Monday, February 9, 2004		Guest Speak

PC users know the power of UPS
Subodh Tagare

Subodh Tagare Marketing Manager, APC India

IN this digital world, nearly every aspect of our life depends upon some electrical device. Whether your equipment is in the home or office it needs clean and consistent power to operate reliably. In India, electric power is often unstable - voltage dips, surges and power cuts are a common occurrence. Unfortunately, a power disturbance due to lightening strikes or a temporary glitch in the electricity supply is all it takes for you to lose your valuable home electronic equipment. Interruptions in electrical power can result from a variety of factors, such as:

• Transformer failure or line damage.

• Natural disasters and damage from severe weather.

• Utility company power cuts and planned load shedding.

• Inadequate power-handling capacity in multi-or single-tenant buildings.

Unpredictable power disturbances such as surges, spikes, voltage dips and power cuts can seriously damage the sensitive electrical circuitry in the PCs. In fact, studies conducted by IBM, Bell Labs and others showed that spikes and surges higher than 1 volt cause 88 per cent of all problems experienced by electronic equipment. A complete and momentary power cuts can cause computer users to lose hours of work when their systems shut down without warning. Power failures can even damage hard drives, resulting in the loss of all data on a system. Not surprisingly, power disturbances are the largest, single cause of data loss, accounting for 45.3 per cent of all problems.

For many of us living in this age of information and technology, the costs of power interruptions, in terms of downtime, lost data, and equipment failure, are high and getting higher. Any time a power interruption delays work-in-progress, valuable time is lost and lost time means lost money. Power disturbances cannot be eliminated but the damage they cause can be prevented by the use of innovative end-to-end power protection solutions. Providing alternatives or backups for the facility power supply is one method to insulate your electronic equipment against external conditions that are beyond your control.

Trust UPS

An uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system affords protection against both momentary and prolonged power cuts. It provides protection against disastrous data loss by supplying backup power for a sufficient amount of time to save data and perform an organised shutdown of systems and other equipment. An uninterruptible power supply, such as an APC Back-UPS will instantly switch your computer to emergency battery backup power and allow you to work through brief power cuts or to shut down your system in the event of an extended load shedding.

A perfect uninterruptible power supply (UPS) for small business desktops should allow the user to save files and shutdown the operating system properly during extended power cuts. High-performance surge suppression for AC line and network/datalines, to protect all paths to your system from electrical noise and damaging power surges - even lightning, is an absolute must.

A UPS should also protect your equipment from power fluctuations such as low voltage. These short-term decreases in voltage levels are the most common power anomaly, accounting for up to 87 per cent of all disturbances. Low voltage starves a computer of the power it needs to function, placing undue strain on internal components, which ultimately causes data glitches, hardware failure and unexpected system crashes.

Choosing a UPS

A reliable UPS should have:

• Wide voltage window to enable work under poor voltage conditions

• (at least 230VAC,+ - 20%)

• Automatic Voltage Regulation (AVR) feature to handle voltage fluctuations

• Sufficient back up time (at least 20 minutes on a single PC)

• Built in diagnostics to monitor health of the UPS.

• Audible and visual alarms.

• Power management software to enable automatic graceful shutdown before battery power runs out.

• Resettable circuit breaker to avoid unnecessary trips to the service centre (For example, when a fuse blows out).

• A comprehensive onsite warranty covering UPS and battery for 2 years.

Mobile computing

In today’s corporate world, the day does not end at 5 pm. Your laptop is your extended office, your lifeline to business. It goes on the plane, in the car - anywhere you go. On the road, power is anyone’s guess. There’s no telling what the power might be like at hotels and offices in faraway locations. That is why power protection for your laptop is crucial to your success. Power glitches can travel through unprotected AC lines and telephone lines, destroying motherboards and modems on your laptops. You need to protect your laptop, all its data and its modem from uncertain power supplies on the road-or anywhere-with a Surge Arrest protector.

With the right power availability solutions there’s no need to worry about power disturbances, the costs of unscheduled downtime or equipment failure. One needs to choose reliable solutions for home and small office networks that will protect your valuable equipment and data against unreliable power.